


First, Ground Yourself

by HigharollaKockamamie



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: AU, Consensual, M/M, MT Prompto, Wire Play, weird robot sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-14
Updated: 2018-01-14
Packaged: 2019-03-04 14:35:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,816
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13366773
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HigharollaKockamamie/pseuds/HigharollaKockamamie
Summary: Ardyn gives his pet project some care and maintenance. For Promdyn Ship Week Day 6, Personal MT AU.





	First, Ground Yourself

Three steps out of a productive audience with the Emperor, High Commander Nox Fleuret said, “Must you call it that?” 

“Call who what?” Ardyn dusted off the brim of his hat. “At ease, my dear.” 

The prototype MT to one side relaxed his grip on his weapon and set it into carrying position on his back. The highly strung Tenebraean on the other was going to cause himself jaw damage if he kept up that habit of clenching his teeth.

“ _It. That._ ” 

“Oh, my honor guard?” They passed through the antechamber, and Ardyn nodded to a few people who owed him favors and one who would by the end of the week. He left the usual wake of whispers. “How would you propose I refer to him?”

“It must have some sort of designation.” The commander walked much as he spoke: in a straight line, looking to neither side, expecting any crowd or debris to get out of his way. 

“Very well, if that is what you wish.” Ardyn slid his card through the reader by the door, and they passed from the more public areas of the Keep to the research and development wing that was his second home. The décor was just as austere, but with an eye to functionality rather than impressing anyone. The grated floors and exposed girders had a certain industrial appeal. “Helm off, En Aich Zero Five Nine Five Three Two Three Four.”

The MT set his hands to the side of his helmet and lifted. Commander Nox Fleuret's angular face wore the same mingled horror and terrible curiosity of anyone awaiting a glimpse of the writhing darkness that must lurk behind the impassive green metal mask. What Ardyn loved best was the shift to a confusion of relief and dismay when the ominous being's true face emerged into the light. The MT tucked the helmet beneath his arm and stood at attention, awaiting further orders.

“What is the meaning of this?” said the commander, in his charming way of requesting further information. 

“Oh, nothing much. It occurred to me it would be a fascinating experiment to let En Aich Zero Five Nine Five Three Two Three Four – that is to say, the neural network in its server-contained infancy – contribute to the design of its own casing. I find the results rather fetching, don't you?” 

There was an appeal to the contrast of the cold, functional armor with the young, fresh face, the petite upturned nose with its scattering of freckles, the vivid blue eyes, and the swoop of helmet-mussed blond hair. The incongruity made him akin to a work of modern art. 

The commander said, “I don't see the point. An MT is an MT.” 

Everyone was a critic. 

“A truth by tautology,” said Ardyn, “yet this one is unique. He is, for example, capable of speech when so directed. Try giving him permission.”

Commander Nox Fleuret eyed the patient prototype. “En Aich Zero Five Nine...”

“Five Three Two Three Four,” Ardyn added helpfully.

The commander ignored him. “Speak.” 

“Hi,” the MT said. “Why are you so mad all the time?” 

“As you can see,” Ardyn said, once he was capable, “he is quite perceptive.” 

“You haven't taught him the correct way to speak to a superior officer,” the commander growled. 

“Oh.” There was the furrow of brow that indicated a slight allocation of processor time to solving a new problem. It cleared when the MT reached a conclusion. “Why are you so mad all the time, sir?” 

“Well?” The commander shifted the target of his glare to the innocent Chancellor, who had through impressive effort not made a sound at all. He made a sharp gesture of discontent. “Discipline it.” 

“Go right ahead,” said Ardyn, with a gracious sweep of his hand. “Strike him. Roughly as you like.” 

The commander hesitated, as though suspecting the placid MT to be be trapped or poisoned like a malicious treasure chest. He reached his decision, raised his arm, and backhanded the prototype across the face. A pair of workmen carrying a crate in their direction looked up at the resounding slap and decided on a more circuitous route to the elevator. 

The MT blinked and said, “Sir?”

“En Aich Zero Five Nine Five Three Two Three Four is a machine, Commander,” Ardyn explained. “He feels no pain, no boredom. One could lock him in a coffin for a week and he would only go into sleep mode to conserve power. Anything unsatisfactory in En Aich Zero Five Nine Five Three Two Three Four's behavior is a fault in his programming and can be corrected with the due adjustment. He can be no more willfully malicious than a raincloud. Can you, En Aich Zero Five-”

“Call it something else,” the commander snarled. He stomped away across the grating, the ends of his white coat snapping at his heels like two small belligerent dogs. 

The little MT moved close by Ardyn's side. “He never answered me.” 

“Some things, my dear, we must conjecture from incomplete data.”

* * *

“Promulgate. Proprietary. Heft.” 

Ardyn turned a page and began filling a fresh white sheet with looping script. He scattered crumbs of useful information throughout, as though each were recent and hard-won. He did enough of these reports to keep Verstael Besithia's interest, though they hardly kept his own.

“Totality. Application. Torsion. Femtosecond.” 

He was seated at the desk in the corner of a spacious workshop scattered with projects in various states of completion or disrepair. The most recent of these was darting between them, flipping through the notebooks and manuals that lay stacked and scattered about. Once Ardyn had given the command to shift out of his formal mode, the MT had gone from the inhuman silent stillness of a standard unit to a thing in constant motion. Ardyn had been experimenting with giving him the capacity to fidget, as well as an impulse to seek new information that would in an organic creature be called curiosity. Though some, such as Commander Nox Fleuret, might judge those parameters as set somewhat higher than optimal, Ardyn found the results fascinating. 

“Autonomous. Preemptively. Exemption. Neglect.”

Using physical eyes to read and a physical mouth to speak were novel delights to the prototype. He enjoyed the taste of unusual words. Ardyn filed away a notion to have him attempt poetry one of these days. 

“Conductor. Assumption. Derelict. Asymptote.”

Ardyn lowered his pen. It never stopped feeling strange to cease writing without sprinkling the page with sand. “Come here a moment.” 

“Gener-- yes, sir!” 

The MT hopped over a piece of machinery like a doe leaping over a fallen log. He stood at attention in front of Ardyn's desk, back straight, hands clasped behind. He was out of his armor and in the clothing he had chosen from one of Ardyn's favorite secondhand stores, during an outing that was a treat for him and, in the quiet terror of the citizens witnessing a piece of cutting-edge military technology rifling through racks of t-shirts, a bit of fun for Ardyn. Today what he had taken from his locker in the corner was a pair of ripped jeans and a leather vest over a plaid shirt. The pinnacle of Niflheimian artificial intelligence technology loved plaid. 

Ardyn leaned back in his chair and said, “What is your name?” 

“I'm called my-dear _or_ En Aich Zero Five Nine Five Three Two Three Four _or_ that-thing _or_ the-chancellor's-pet-project _or_ that-creepy-thing, sir!” 

Ardyn tapped his pen on his lips. “None of those are, strictly speaking, a name.” 

“Oh.” The MT rocked back and forth on his feet. “Then I guess I don't have one.” 

“It's quite an impractical thing to lack. I've tried that now and again, for mystery's sake, and I've found it's more inconvenience than it's worth. Hm, what shall we call you? Perhaps Alkamia, for the mixture of substances composing you, Novus for the new being you are, Talmus for your watchful eye...” An experiment occurred to Ardyn. “I know. Why not select your own?” 

The MT jangled when he perked up. He had a penchant for variety in textures, and had affixed rows of safety pins to his vest. “How about Prompto?” 

It was too swift an answer for even his prodigious processing power to have concocted on the spot. “You've given this consideration.” 

“I thought about it some.” The MT rubbed his hand on the back of his neck in the gesture programmed in to demonstrate bashfulness. “See, I'm yours and I'm unique, right? So, PROtotype Magitek, Personal. The Only!” 

Ardyn folded his hands over his half-written report. “That is not at all how acronyms work.” 

“Oh.” Dejection sank the prototype's shoulders. Though his emotional responses were perhaps a bit exaggerated, Ardyn found it endearing. 

“I like it.” Ardyn looked down at his work with a pretense of not noticing how the MT immediately brightened. “Fetch me the teal folder on the left shelf, Prompto.” 

“Yes, sir!” 

Ardyn attended to his correspondence and a few projects with desultory attention, tweaking this, toying with that. Nothing of terrible interest or importance. All things that needed to be set in motion had been. He was biding his time, and he had so very much of that. 

At his side, looking over his shoulder, the newly-christened Prompto said, “Do you have other names?” 

“Hm?” 

“I mean, I know there's Chancellor that people say, and Ardyn-Izunia that you sign, and that-man that people say when you're not looking. And there's sir, but that's general and it can mean a lot of people. It feels like there should be something that's just you, you know? I mean, from me.” 

“My proper designation?” Ardyn flipped a page and ran his eyes over the schematic on the back. He'd fed many of those into Prompto's data banks when he was only a young program, as well as literature and lineages, science and select works of history. “That is my riddle for you. You have all the information you need to divine it from the blanks in between. I wonder if you will be able to extrapolate from the incomplete data.” 

“Oh.” Prompto's lip slipped between his teeth. “Is sir okay for now?” 

“A charming formality. Of course.” 

The MT nodded. He was not long at ease. As Ardyn worked, his mechanical companion's fingers twitched idly and he gnawed on his lower lip, the outward expressions of his devoting processor power to a quandary. 

“What is troubling you, my dear?” said Ardyn, finding the prototype's thoughts more interesting than a checklist of requisitions. 

Prompto perched on the edge of the desk. He clasped his hands between his knees and let his feet swing as he looked down. “Does it bug you when people call you creepy?” 

“Ah. Your excellent sensors picked that up, did they.” 

He had been designed with sharp senses in all respects, though the emphasis was on sight. That as well had given a wealth of unintended effects; the MT had an eye for color and visual presentation that manifested in a locker festooned with pictures cut from some old editions of _Dragoon's Quarterly_ and _Rolling Materia_ that Commodore Highwind would never miss. He had even gleaned a few from within the dense, technical pages of _The Lancer._

“Yeah,” Prompto said. He was pressing his fingers together, an unpreprogrammed gesture. He was becoming able to invent his own, or to mimic things he had seen on a level that could be called unconscious. “People whisper when you walk by.” 

“Do they? Isn't it nice to be noticed.” 

The MT's vest chimed softly when he shifted his shoulders. “Doesn't it bother you?” 

“Not at all, and why should it? As you mentioned a moment ago, they say the same of you.” 

“Yeah, but that's different. I'm supposed to be scary when I'm working, and I'm not human, anyway.”

“Perhaps, but you are very close, and drawing nearer by the day. You are an innovation, and humans find that troubling. They dislike anything that reminds them they are not so special as they must believe – and are less than fond of those like me who impinge on the gods' vaunted territory of creating new life.” 

“Oh.” Prompto swung his feet and gazed off at the wall. Though his processors were crafted to be silent, Ardyn could imagine them humming beneath his melancholy mien. 

There was a pause of some time while Ardyn's pen scratched over the government mimeographs. 

Prompto said, “You always say 'humans' like it's a set that doesn't include you.” 

Ardyn was proud. His creation was becoming quite perceptive.

“You mustn't mind an old man's affectations.” Ardyn reached across the desk to lift the MT's hand. The flesh was warm and yielding, and even had a pulse. He had spared no effort, and put his devils to good use in the details. “Don't I feel as human as yourself?” 

The little restless movements had stilled. Prompto watched him, his eyes large and liquid in the light that neither of them required. His fingers curled. “Sir...” 

What a marvel he was. A mass of circuitry hidden beneath artificial skin and muscle, given motivation by daemon-extracted energies, yet capable of empathy that would never cross the mind of a natural mortal. Who could say which aspect would more horrify god and man. Were any of the Six present, they would punish such blasphemy. They were not, and Ardyn was. 

In the moment of watching compassion arrange the features Ardyn had constructed, he was struck by a notion.

“Ah.” Ardyn ran his thumb over the MT's palm, then placed his hand on his forehead. “You're running rather warm. How are your cooling systems?” 

Prompto blinked rapidly, the telltale sign of processes shifting. “I could run a diagnostic-” 

“No need, no need.” Ardyn shoved his papers away into a pile that Prompto swiftly tidied. “It's high time we perform a little maintenance. I haven't given you a good thorough cleaning since you've been in this new case, have I?” 

“Nope.” The complex system of constantly adjusting and improvising programs that comprised the MT responded to the prospect of something new with a visible mix of nerves, excitement, and curiosity. “What should I do?” 

“Fetch my toolcase – the one for fine work.” 

Ardyn abandoned his desk in favor of sweeping an area clear of debris, laying down a tarp, and pulling over a chair. Most of the prototype's adjustments were done remotely through a tablet, yet there was something to be said for intimacy of the hands-on approach.

“Strip to the waist.” 

“Are we gonna do something fun?” Prompto said through the shirt tangled over his face. 

“Perhaps,” Ardyn said, promisingly. He took off his own coat, set it over his desk, and rolled up his sleeves. It wouldn't do to have anything in the way. “On your knees, my dear.”

Prompto knelt, bare back to Ardyn. The synthetic skin was indistinguishable from that of a human, marked with freckles that had been distributed based on a random number generator that drew from traffic noise at one of the Gralea's central intersections. Ardyn imbued his hands with a whisper of daemonic power and drew his fingertips in a square over the MT's back, like tracing a windowframe. The seam revealed itself in the path of his touch.

“Do provide feedback,” Ardyn said as he thumbed the release and the panel slid back. Inside was an ordered array of cords and circuitry. A rare glimpse into the heart of his masterpiece. “This should feel pleasant. You mustn't squirm.” 

“Yessir,” Prompto said. “A-ok. No go on the squirming.” 

His shoulders rose with quickened breath, but he held very still as Ardyn took a soft cloth in hand and reached inside him. 

Prompto said, “Oh.” 

“How is that?” Ardyn said solicitously. He ran the cloth down a clutch of wires that curved like a river bank. 

“F, feels kind of weird.” Even from the back, it was apparent when he swallowed. 

“Not badly, I hope.” Ardyn worked the cloth beneath the bundle of wires to take care of the underside.

“Nah.” The word was rough at the edges. “It's...nice.” 

As it was meant to be, to keep him still and cooperative during a cleaning. It was likely that the human traits Ardyn had gone to such care to engineer would result in a very human panic at having one's inner workings exposed, and it would be troublesome to have to restrain him for routine maintenance. Pleasure was a more elegant incentive. 

Prompto's breath caught as Ardyn slipped the cloth between wires and slowly dragged it down. Perhaps, as with the curiosity and fidgeting programs, Ardyn had set the parameter a shade high. 

Oh, this was going to be fun. 

“Hm, I've been remiss. It's quite dusty in here.” Ardyn leaned in to run the cloth over a cluster of wires further in, stroking their length like the spine of a cat. “I must take better care of you.” 

The little MT's head was falling slowly to the side. He said, “ _Oh_.” 

“Now, be patient with me,” Ardyn said, trailing the cloth leftwards and running it over a nest of thin cables. “We must be thorough. I would not want to miss any little detail.”

“Yeah.” Prompto's breathing was labored. “W-wouldn't want to.” 

He had a tendency to resort to echolalia when a large portion of his RAM was in use.

“Just around here...” Ardyn hummed under his breath as he worked his way to the right, a sound that mixed with Prompto's soft whimpers. “There we are. Tch, look at that.” 

He withdrew the cloth and held it before Prompto's face, showing where the white was marred with streaks of gray. It took a moment for Prompto to notice. 

“Pretty dirty,” the little MT said faintly. His voice synthesizers were quite advanced. They could create any variety of inflection, including masked disappointment. “Are you done?” 

“Yes, that will be- oh. What's this?” Ardyn peered into what would be darkness to weaker eyes, and reached in to feel with his fingers across a metal edge. Prompto must have bitten his lip to make his gasp so quiet. “That won't do. The Chancellor's honor guard can't have something so vulgar as loose screws.” 

Ardyn selected a tiny, delicate screwdriver. When he set it into the grooves, the little MT's hand clenched at his side. Ardyn gave it a few turns with the full attention the task deserved, until he felt it settle snugly home. 

“Next,” he whispered in Prompto's ear, and was rewarded with a swallowed whine. 

There were five in all, each attended to with due consideration and a few methodical twists of his wrist. Ardyn set the screwdriver aside and confirmed the work by stroking his fingers over the metal, satisfied that each was secure. 

“There now. How does that feel?” 

It took a moment for the MT to gather his resources and respond. “Good, sir. R, really nice.” 

“Ah, but there is still dust adhering to this circuit board. It's quite stubborn.” Ardyn leaned forward with a creak of the chair and whispered in Prompto's ear. “I'm going to need a little brush.” 

Prompto made a high, thin sound. 

Ardyn combed wisps of blond hair away from the nape of the little MT's neck and let his tool make its way inside him. The board in question was below and to the left of his metal spine, and at a slightly awkward angle. Ardyn made certain to move very slowly, working the soft bristles against the surface, in between the chips. 

“Ah,” Prompto said, voice quiet and constant as the whisper of the brush. “Sir. Oh, sir.” 

Ardyn was a thorough and responsible owner. He was sure to get the brush into every crevice, a gentle yet relentless polishing motion over the delicate components as Prompto's murmurs shifted to soft, urgent cries. They mounted as Ardyn shifted wires aside to move the brush more rapidly over the hidden side of the board, rushing towards a peak with the MT's rapid breath. Ardyn reached further into his creation to access the innermost board, as wires gripped his wrists and tingled with electricity.

“Sir,” Prompto panted. “Ahh, sir, that's so deep. Sir, that's so-- ahh, _please_ -” 

Ardyn stopped. Prompto's cry was as interestingly mechanical as it was bitten back. His respiration, not merely ornamental but a means of supplying oxygen and cooling his systems, was nearing the point of frantic. Yet, touchingly, he obeyed orders and remained motionless. 

“What's this?” Ardyn murmured. Without withdrawing his hand, he shifted the brush into the grip of his little finger, and with the others felt along a bank of cables right where they were plugged in. His thumb and forefinger closed on the connector. “This is in the fifth input, but it would be far more efficient in the fourth. Don't you agree?” 

“Yessir!” Prompto said immediately. 

“All right, we're going to have to make an adjustment- here.” Ardyn pulled the connection free, with a gasp from Prompto. He moved it over to the neighboring hole and poised it there, pin resting on the rim. “Now, to place it home. Be ready. One, two...” 

The sound in the workroom went silent as Prompto held his breath. 

“Three.” 

Ardyn pushed the cable into place with a satisfying click. Prompto's body went rigid, and for all its static, his cry of release was shockingly human. 

“You may move,” Ardyn said into his man's ear as he extracted himself, and Prompto slumped forward with a succession of soft moans. Ardyn suspected that despite the unusual nature of the stimulation, his body had responded in the classical way. 

“There, now.” Ardyn closed the panel and sealed the seams back into invisibility. He patted his little MT's back. “All finished. Doesn't that feel better?” 

“Mm.” Prompto collapsed onto the ground. He rolled over with a crinkle of the tarp. The recovery of his systems in the aftermath of the stimulation gave his eyes a dreamlike haze. “Way better.” 

Ardyn put his tools away and zipped up the case. He would have to return to his desk. Paperwork seemed less enervating after that refreshing interval. So many things were so much less daunting with a companion. 

He leaned down to offer his creation a hand. Prompto grasped it, pulled himself up, and said, “Thanks, your majesty.” 

Ardyn would have claimed he could no longer be surprised. 

“You divined my riddle,” he said. 

“Yep!” The half-dressed Prompto nearly glowed with playful pride, a sight that imbued Ardyn with a strange ache. “Just had to rattle around my memory banks some. Now I know what you are, but what am I?” 

Ardyn placed his hand on the back of Prompto's neck. He pulled him forward and placed a kiss just above his eye. 

“My dear, for me, you are the last new thing under the sun.”


End file.
